Down-adown-derry: A book of fairy poems

by Walter de la Mare

Reprint of the 1922 ed. published by Holt, New York.

Genres: Poetry, Fantasy

195 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1922

About the author

Walter John de la Mare was an English poet, short story writer and novelist. He is probably best remembered for his works for children, for his poem "The Listeners", and for his psychological horror short fiction, including "Seaton's Aunt" and "All Hallows". In 1921, his novel Memoirs of a Midget won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for fiction, and his post-war Collected Stories for Children won the 1947 Carnegie Medal for British children's books.

Reviews

[Silverin · Rating 4 out of 5]

A cute collection of fairy poems by Walter de la Mare with beautiful illustrations by Dorothy P. Lathrop.

The Fairies Dancing:

I heard the fairies in a ring
Sing as they tripped a lilting round
Soft as the moon on wavering wing.

[Elaine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cute, charming poems. Almost a little too cute at times, spoiled as I am to modern cynicism and antique fear of the fae. I expect a bit more fairy gold that melts away at dawn and fairy wishes calculated to be literal and cruel when granted. These are only occasionally mildly eerie, but if you adjust your expectations that way, you won't be disappointed by this little collection.

Found a Project Gutenberg copy of this to load onto my Kindle -- it never fails to piss me off to see public domain works costing money on Amazon. UPenn.edu hosts a good copy(illustrations included); the one I tried from Archive.org showed up with lots of OCR gibberish.

[Shawn Thrasher]

Very Edwardian, full of fairies and Pan; you half expect Mole and Badger (The Wind in the Willows) to walk out at some point (No Mr. Toad here though). The poems are very old fashioned, sort of like you would find in an old children's magazine like St. Nicholas; I wonder if 1922 they felt old fashioned as well? I did not connect with the illustrations at all; Peacock Pie had W. Heath Robinson illustrations that were often haunting and beautiful (and Edward Ardizzone did a version as well that I have at home waiting to re-read and enjoy!) so I missed those kind of illustrations. Two poems that moved me enough to keep for later: "Snow" and "Haunted." Still love Walter de la Mare, even if this wasn't my absolute favorite.

[Ana Luiza · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent poetry and beautiful illustrations, though I'll admit I wasn't overly excited to keep on reading and procrastinated on finishing it.